AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidder

This call enables a seller to send messages to bidders, and to users who have made offers via Best Offer, regarding an active item listing. Messages sent to users appear in their My Messages inbox. Sellers can use AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidder to send up to ten messages per call. The following restrictions apply:

The item specified by ItemID must be currently active
The message sender must be the seller of the item
The recipients must be bidders on that item, or they must have made offers on that item via Best Offer

Request Details

AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidder accepts up to ten messages per request.

The call returns success for each message that was successfully sent. For messages that were not successfully sent, the application needs to parse the error response to determine whether or not it is possible to recover from the error.

If required fields are missing from the message, they can be added and the message can be resent. However, if the basic requirements between the seller and the bidder are not met (for example, if the item is no longer active), the message will not be able to be resent and the seller must use an alternate means to contact the user (such as contacting the former bidder via the eBay.com Web site). To contact users by phone, you must use GetUserContactDetails to obtain the additional contact information.

AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidder returns Success or Failure (an error) for the entire call, as well as each for each message container in the response. The call may succeed as a whole, even though individual messages in the request might have failed. The following figure illustrates a call that succeeded, although some messages failed:

Figure 1: AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidder response containers

Note that if a warning occurs, the result set will contain both normal data and an error construct. See Error Handling for details.

Testing AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidder

You can test AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidder in the Sandbox.

To test the call, you must have a "bidding" relationship between two users. The caller must have listed the specified item, and the target users must have bid, or placed an offer, on the item. In addition, the item must be currently active.

Create a seller in the sandbox and have them list an item. You must allow Best Offers on your item if you want to test sending messages to users who have made Best Offers.
Create a buyer in the sandbox and have them place a bid (or an offer) on the item. You can use the Sandbox UI for this task.
Call AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidder with the test seller's authentication token. Specify the test buyer in the RecipientID field and the item you created in ItemID field.
After sending the message, check the buyer's My Messages in the Sandbox UI to see if the message successfully reached their inbox.

Further testing information can be obtained through Developer Support.

Related Information

See Communication Between Members.

See also the reference documentation for these calls:

AddMemberMessageAAQToPartner - Enables a buyer and seller in an order relationship to send messages to each other's My Messages Inboxes.
AddMemberMessageRTQ - Enables a seller to reply to a question about an active item listing.
DeleteMyMessages - Removes selected messages for a given user.
GetMemberMessages - Retrieves a list of the messages buyers have posted about your active item listings.
GetMyMessages - Retrieves information about the messages sent to a user.
GetUserContactDetails - Returns contact information for a specified user, given that a bidding relationship (as either a buyer or seller) exists between the caller and the user.
ReviseMyMessages - Sets the read state for messages, sets the flagged state of messages, and moves messages into and out of folders.
ReviseMyMessagesFolders - Renames, removes, or restores the specified My Messages folders for a given user.

AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidder Input

The box below lists all fields that could be included in the call request. To learn more about an individual field or its type, click its name in the box (or scroll down to find it in the table below the box).

See also Samples.

See also the Deprecated Objects link above. Fields presented in this color are deprecated, and fields presented in this color are (or soon will be) non-operational.

The XML prototype does not include requester credentials. This is a documentation limitation only (see Standard Requester Credentials for Making Calls).

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderRequest xmlns="urn:ebay:apis:eBLBaseComponents">
  <!-- Call-specific Input Fields -->
  <AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderRequestContainer> AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderRequestContainerType
    <CorrelationID> string </CorrelationID>
    <ItemID> string </ItemID>
    <MemberMessage> MemberMessageType
      <Body> string </Body>
      <EmailCopyToSender> boolean </EmailCopyToSender>
      <HideSendersEmailAddress> boolean </HideSendersEmailAddress>
      <RecipientID> string </RecipientID>
      <!-- ... more RecipientID values allowed here ... -->
    </MemberMessage>
  </AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderRequestContainer>
  <!-- ... more AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderRequestContainer nodes allowed here ... -->
  <!-- Standard Input Fields -->
  <ErrorLanguage> string </ErrorLanguage>
  <MessageID> string </MessageID>
  <Version> string </Version>
  <WarningLevel> WarningLevelCodeType </WarningLevel>
</AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderRequest>

Argument	Type	Occurrence	Meaning

Call-specific Input Fields [Jump to standard fields]

AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderRequestContainer	AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderRequestContainerType	Required, repeatable: [1..10]	Allows a seller to send up to 10 messages to bidders and users who have made offers (via Best Offer) during an active listing.
AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderRequestContainer .CorrelationID	string	Required	A CorrelationID value is required for each AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderRequestContainer container that is used in the request. The CorrelationID value returned under each AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderResponseContainer container is used to correlate each member message container in the request with its corresponding member message container in the response. The same CorrelationID value that you pass into a request will be returned in the CorrelationID field in the response.
AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderRequestContainer .ItemID	string	Required	An eBay ID that uniquely identifies a given item. Must be a currently active item. Max length: 19 (Note: The eBay database specifies 38. Currently, Item IDs are usually 9 to 12 digits).
AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderRequestContainer .MemberMessage	MemberMessageType	Required	Holds the content of the message.
AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderRequestContainer .MemberMessage.Body	string	Required	The content of the message is input into this string field. HTML formatting is not allowed in the body of the message. If plain HTML is used, an error occurs and the message will not go through. If encoded HTML is used, the message may go through but the formatting will not be successful, and the recipient of the message will just see the HTML formatting tags. Max length: 1000.
AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderRequestContainer .MemberMessage .EmailCopyToSender	boolean	Optional	Specifies whether or not to email a copy of the message to the sender. If omitted, this defaults to whatever the user set in preferences.
AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderRequestContainer .MemberMessage .HideSendersEmailAddress	boolean	Optional	Deprecated as of version 579. Currently ignored. Specifies whether or not to hide sender's email address from the recipient. If omitted, this defaults to whatever the user set in preferences--or on site policy, which determines whether or not this field is recognized. Note: This tag is no longer operational. Deprecation version: 579. See also Deprecated Objects.
AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderRequestContainer .MemberMessage.RecipientID	string	Required, repeatable: [1..*]	Recipient's eBay user ID. For AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidder, it must be the seller of an item, that item's bidder, or a user who has made an offer on that item using Best Offer. Note: maxOccurs is a shared schema element and needs to be unbounded for AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidder. For AddMemberMessageRTQ, this field is mandatory if ItemID is not in the request. For all other uses, there can only be one RecipientID.

Standard Input Fields

ErrorLanguage	string	Optional	Use ErrorLanguage to return error strings for the call in a different language from the language commonly associated with the site that the requesting user is registered with. Specify the standard RFC 3066 language identification tag (e.g., en_US). ID--- country ----- ----- de_AT Austria de_CH Switzerland de_DE Germany en_AU Australia en_CA Canada en_GB United Kingdom en_SG Singapore en_US United States es_ES Spain fr_BE Belgium (French) fr_CA Canada (French) fr_FR France it_IT Italy nl_BE Belgium (Dutch) nl_NL Netherlands zh_CN China en_IN India en_IE Ireland zh_HK Hong Kong See Tags for the Identification of Languages.
MessageID	string	Optional	Most Trading API calls support a MessageID element in the request and a CorrelationID element in the response. If you pass in a MessageID in a request, the same value will be returned in the CorrelationID field in the response. Pairing these values can help you track and confirm that a response is returned for every request and to match specific responses to specific requests. If you do not pass a MessageID value in the request, CorrelationID is not returned. Note: GetCategories is designed to retrieve very large sets of metadata that change once a day or less often. To improve performance, these calls return cached responses when you request all available data (with no filters). When this occurs, the MessageID and CorrelationID fields aren't applicable. However, if you specify an input filter to reduce the amount of data returned, the calls retrieve the latest data (not cached). When this occurs, MessageID and CorrelationID are applicable.
Version	string	Conditional	The version number of the API code that you are programming against (e.g., 549). The version you specify for a call has these basic effects: - It indicates the version of the code lists and other data that eBay should use to process your request. - It indicates the schema version you are using. You need to use a version that is greater than or equal to the lowest supported version. For the SOAP API: If you are using the SOAP API, this field is required. Specify the version of the WSDL your application is using. For the XML API: If you are using the XML API, this field has no effect. Instead, specify the version in the X-EBAY-API-COMPATIBILITY-LEVEL HTTP header. (If you specify Version in the body of an XML API request and it is different from the value in the HTTP header, eBay returns an informational warning that the value in the HTTP header was used instead.) See: Routing the Request (Gateway URLs) eBay Schema Versioning Strategy Lowest Supported Version
WarningLevel	WarningLevelCodeType	Optional	Controls whether or not to return warnings when the application passes unrecognized or deprecated elements in a request. An unrecognized element is one that is not defined in any supported version of the schema. Schema element names are case-sensitive, so using WarningLevel can also help you remove any potential hidden bugs within your application due to incorrect case or spelling in field names before you put your application into the Production environment. WarningLevel only validates elements; it doesn't validate XML attributes. It also doesn't control warnings related to user-entered strings or numbers, or warnings for logical errors. We recommend that you only use this during development and debugging. Do not use this in requests in your production code. Applicable values: • High (in) Return warnings when the application passes unrecognized or deprecated elements in a request. • Low (in) Do not return warnings when the application passes unrecognized or deprecated elements in a request. This is the default value if WarningLevel is not specified. See Warning Level.

AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidder Output

The box below lists all fields that might be returned in the response. To learn more about an individual field or its type, click its name in the box (or scroll down to find it in the table below the box).

See also Samples.

See also the Deprecated Objects link above. Fields presented in this color are deprecated, and fields presented in this color are not returned (or soon will not be returned) or are not operational (or soon will be non-operational).

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderResponse xmlns="urn:ebay:apis:eBLBaseComponents">
  <!-- Call-specific Output Fields -->
  <AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderResponseContainer> AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderResponseContainerType
    <Ack> AckCodeType </Ack>
    <CorrelationID> string </CorrelationID>
  </AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderResponseContainer>
  <!-- ... more AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderResponseContainer nodes allowed here ... -->
  <!-- Standard Output Fields -->
  <Ack> AckCodeType </Ack>
  <Build> string </Build>
  <CorrelationID> string </CorrelationID>
  <Errors> ErrorType
    <ErrorClassification> ErrorClassificationCodeType </ErrorClassification>
    <ErrorCode> token </ErrorCode>
    <ErrorParameters ParamID="string"> ErrorParameterType
      <Value> string </Value>
    </ErrorParameters>
    <!-- ... more ErrorParameters nodes allowed here ... -->
    <LongMessage> string </LongMessage>
    <SeverityCode> SeverityCodeType </SeverityCode>
    <ShortMessage> string </ShortMessage>
  </Errors>
  <!-- ... more Errors nodes allowed here ... -->
  <HardExpirationWarning> string </HardExpirationWarning>
  <Timestamp> dateTime </Timestamp>
  <Version> string </Version>
</AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderResponse>

Return Value	Type	Occurrence	Meaning

Call-specific Output Fields [Jump to standard fields]

AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderResponseContainer

AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderResponseContainerType

Always,
repeatable: [1..10]

Container consisting of the Ack field (indicating the result of the send message operation) and the CorrelationID field (used to track multiple send message operations performed in one call).

AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderResponseContainer
.Ack

AckCodeType

Always

Indicates the response status (e.g., success).

Applicable values:

• CustomCode

(out) Reserved for internal or future use.

• Failure

(out) Request processing failed

• PartialFailure

(out) Request processing completed with some failures. See the Errors data to determine which portions of the request failed.

• Success

(out) Request processing succeeded

• Warning

(out) Request processing completed with warning information being included in the response message

AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderResponseContainer
.CorrelationID

string

Always

A CorrelationID value is required for each AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderRequestContainer container that is used in the request. The CorrelationID value returned under each AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderResponseContainer container is used to correlate each member message container in the request with its corresponding member message container in the response. The same CorrelationID value that you pass into a request will be returned in the CorrelationID field in the response.

Standard Output Fields

Ack	AckCodeType	Always	A token representing the application-level acknowledgement code that indicates the response status (e.g., success). The AckCodeType list specifies the possible values for Ack. Applicable values: • CustomCode (out) Reserved for internal or future use. • Failure (out) Request processing failed • Success (out) Request processing succeeded • Warning (out) Request processing completed with warning information being included in the response message (Not all values in AckCodeType apply to this field.)
Build	string	Always	This refers to the specific software build that eBay used when processing the request and generating the response. This includes the version number plus additional information. eBay Developer Support may request the build information when helping you resolve technical issues.
CorrelationID	string	Conditionally	Most Trading API calls support a MessageID element in the request and a CorrelationID element in the response. If you pass in a MessageID in a request, the same value will be returned in the CorrelationID field in the response. Pairing these values can help you track and confirm that a response is returned for every request and to match specific responses to specific requests. If you do not pass a MessageID value in the request, CorrelationID is not returned. Note: GetCategories is designed to retrieve very large sets of metadata that change once a day or less often. To improve performance, these calls return cached responses when you request all available data (with no filters). When this occurs, the MessageID and CorrelationID fields aren't applicable. However, if you specify an input filter to reduce the amount of data returned, the calls retrieve the latest data (not cached). When this occurs, MessageID and CorrelationID are applicable.
Errors	ErrorType	Conditionally, repeatable: [0..*]	A list of application-level errors (if any) that occurred when eBay processed the request. See Error Handling.
Errors.ErrorClassification	ErrorClassificationCodeType	Conditionally	API errors are divided between two classes: system errors and request errors. Applicable values: • CustomCode (out) Reserved for internal or future use. • RequestError (out) An error has occurred either as a result of a problem in the sending application or because the application's end-user has attempted to submit invalid data (or missing data). In these cases, do not retry the request. The problem must be corrected before the request can be made again. If the problem is due to something in the application (such as a missing required field), the application must be changed. If the problem is a result of end-user data, the application must alert the end-user to the problem and provide the means for the end-user to correct the data. Once the problem in the application or data is resolved, resend the request to eBay with the corrected data. • SystemError (out) Indicates that an error has occurred on the eBay system side, such as a database or server down. An application can retry the request as-is a reasonable number of times (eBay recommends twice). If the error persists, contact Developer Technical Support. Once the problem has been resolved, the request may be resent in its original form.
Errors.ErrorCode	token	Conditionally	A unique code that identifies the particular error condition that occurred. Your application can use error codes as identifiers in your customized error-handling algorithms. See the "Errors by Number" document.
Errors.ErrorParameters	ErrorParameterType	Conditionally, repeatable: [0..*]	This optional element carries a list of context-specific error variables that indicate details about the error condition. These are useful when multiple instances of ErrorType are returned.
Errors.ErrorParameters [ attribute ParamID ]	string	Conditionally	The index of the parameter in the list of parameter types returned within the error type.
Errors.ErrorParameters.Value	string	Conditionally	The value of the variable (e.g., the attribute set ID)
Errors.LongMessage	string	Conditionally	A more detailed description of the condition that raised the error.
Errors.SeverityCode	SeverityCodeType	Conditionally	Indicates whether the error is a severe error (causing the request to fail) or an informational error (a warning) that should be communicated to the user. Applicable values: • CustomCode (out) Reserved for internal or future use • Error (out) Application-level error • Warning (out) Warning or informational error
Errors.ShortMessage	string	Conditionally	A brief description of the condition that raised the error.
HardExpirationWarning	string	Conditionally	Expiration date of the user's authentication token. Only returned within the 7-day period prior to a token's expiration. To ensure that user authentication tokens are secure and to help avoid a user's token being compromised, tokens have a limited life span. A token is only valid for a period of time (set by eBay). After this amount of time has passed, the token expires and must be replaced with a new token.
Timestamp	dateTime	Always	This value represents the date and time when eBay processed the request. The time zone of this value is GMT and the format is the ISO 8601 date and time format (YYYY-MM-DDTHH:MM:SS.SSSZ). See Time Values in the eBay Web Services guide for information about this time format and converting to and from the GMT time zone. Note: GetCategories and other Trading API calls are designed to retrieve very large sets of metadata that change once a day or less often. To improve performance, these calls return cached responses when you request all available data (with no filters). When this occurs, this time value reflects the time the cached response was created. Thus, this value is not necessarily when the request was processed. However, if you specify an input filter to reduce the amount of data returned, the calls retrieve the latest data (not cached). When this occurs, this time value does reflect when the request was processed.
Version	string	Always	The version of the response payload schema. Indicates the version of the schema that eBay used to process the request. See "Standard Data for All Calls" in the eBay Web Services Guide for information on using the response version when troubleshooting "CustomCode" values that appear in the response.

AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidder Detail Controls

Detail Control: DetailLevel

This call does not support varying Detail Levels. You do not need to pass DetailLevel in the request.

AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidder Samples

New to making API calls? Please see Routing the Request.

Note: Some item IDs, user IDs, or other data in these samples might no longer be active on eBay. If necessary, you can substitute current eBay data in your requests.

Sample: Basic Call

Sends messages to two users who have made Best Offers on an item.

Description

Magical Bookseller listed an item with a Best Offer option. She received two offers on the book, and she can use AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidder to send messages each bidder with the results of their offers.

Input

This request contains two AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderRequestContainer nodes, one for each message being sent. Note that the ItemId is the same for each message, although you can use one call to send messages regarding more than a single item. Use CorrelationID values to make it easier to interpret the results.

XML format (HTTP POST). Also available is the .txt version of this XML.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderRequest xmlns="urn:ebay:apis:eBLBaseComponents">
  <RequesterCredentials>
    <eBayAuthToken>ABC...123</eBayAuthToken>
  </RequesterCredentials>
  <AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderRequestContainer>
    <CorrelationID>1</CorrelationID>
    <ItemID>170000029202</ItemID>
    <MemberMessage>
      <Body>
        Greetings! Thank you for your offer. In fact, you made the Best Offer,
        so I am happy to inform you that you won the book.
      </Body>
      <RecipientID>bountifulbuyer</RecipientID>
    </MemberMessage>
  </AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderRequestContainer>
  <AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderRequestContainer>
    <CorrelationID>2</CorrelationID>
    <ItemID>170000029202</ItemID>
    <MemberMessage>
      <Body>
        Greetings! Thank you for your offer. I am sorry to inform you that another
        bidder also made an offer, and I have decided to go with their offer.
        Good luck with your future bidding.
      </Body>
      <RecipientID>megabuyer</RecipientID>
    </MemberMessage>
  </AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderRequestContainer>
</AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderRequest>

Output

The results from this call show that the overall call succeeded, as well as each message within the call.

XML format. Also available is the .txt version of this XML.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderResponse xmlns="urn:ebay:apis:eBLBaseComponents">
  <Timestamp>2006-05-05T19:40:33.988Z</Timestamp>
  <Ack>Success</Ack>
  <Version>459</Version>
  <Build>e459_core_Bundled_2854399_R1</Build>
   <AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderResponseContainer>
    <CorrelationID>1</CorrelationID>
    <Ack>Success</Ack>
  </AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderResponseContainer>
  <AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderResponseContainer>
    <CorrelationID>2</CorrelationID>
    <Ack>Success</Ack>
  </AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderResponseContainer>
</AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderResponse>

AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidder Change History

Version	Description
579 2008-08-20	AddMemberMessagesAAQToBidderRequest (modified): This call can be used for all categories and is not limited to just motors or business categories.
573 2008-07-09	MemberMessage.HideSendersEmailAddress (deprecated): Currently Deprecated for the sandbox environment. It would be deprecated in production starting in September 2008.

User-Contributed Notes

eBay Trading API Call Reference Version 823